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To: Eric L who wrote (8290)	11/27/2000 3:19:21 PM
From: Eric L	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 34857

Re: John Hoffman on GPRS (Speed - Data Roaming - Time Frames) John Hoffman (formerly Bellsouth) discusses the issues raised by the rollout of GPRS. John is now GPRS and Data Services Consulting Director for the GSM Association. >> Spreading the Word GSM Q Magazine Issue 18 October 2000 << gsmworld.com A few excerpts that I found interesting: >> GSM Q: What sort of feedback are you getting regarding operators' concerns about GPRS? Hoffman: I think the frustration of not having terminals is the one I hear the most right now. From the terminal side, it's a natutal lag. I can understand it - but from an operator's standpoint, it's just like it was when we launched GSM. *Having a network and not being able to access it is probably the biggest frustration.* << >> GSM Q: The GRX was discussed in the London conference. What is the GRX? Hoffman: The *GRX is the GPRS Roaming Exchange - an IT network that connects GPRS networks around the world [like] the IT networks out there today which connect all of the Intranets and Internets around the world, so whenever you surf you're using an IT-based backbone. We're going to use similar kinds of backbones to connect the GPRS networks together so GPRS roaming can take place. << >> GSM Q: An area of controversy remains the likely, as opposed to theoretical, data rates that will be offered... Hoffman: At the conference we had a representative of a handset manufacturer who confirmed that actual throughput speeds with applications, CS2 coding and a four timeslot terminal is being confirmed to be 40 or So kilo-bits per second.* Then with compression you can double it or triple it depending on what your compression mechanisms are. So, at the initial launch of GPRS you're going to see speeds as fast as the fastest circuit switched out there today - and very quickly we're going to move up to speeds passing DSL speed. A lot of it is optimisation, not only of your network but of your applications. So there's the terminal device, the number of timeslots and the way they utilise those timeslots,.the compression techniques and the application. Just how efficient is the application anyway? When you're on your PC some applications run faster than others. Same thing with GPRS. And then there's network resources - how many channels do the operators allocate to data services? You're going to see all those things combined together and there's going to be some tweaking. As we move to higher speed terminals with more slots available and more compression techniques and then as we move in towards EDGE and 3GSM, will we see 2Mbit/s? I don't know. I never say never... probably not next year, but we're going to see some very fast data rates from this technology. << >> . By the beginning of the year you should start to see terminals in quantity, networks up and running around the world-I'm going to guess 100 networks up and running by then-you'll see GPRS roaming up and running and the applications being rolled out. So I think at that point in time you would have great opportunity for good dialogue amongst the operator community on just where we are and where we're headed. << - Eric -